


clara.

by heavensenq



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen, Twelveclara
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 22:28:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17671298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heavensenq/pseuds/heavensenq





	clara.

_Let me be brave._

Those are the words he hears, every time he tumbles headfirst into the freezing waters. The icy air wrapping round his body like a threadbare coat, making his eyes stream as he falls so fast, yet not quite fast enough to block out the shaking voice still ringing in his ears. Submerged in the blue-black depths, eye to eye with a carpet of skulls, yet still the only thing that mkes him truly shiver is remembering the way she took her final breath, her body jerking like a puppet, black smoke mingling with the cooling air. It's why he forgets to breathe, remembering the tremor in her voice. The way she said those words.

_Goodbye, Doctor._

So final, so definite. With tears in her eyes and in his, she walks out, and it feels like it's already happened. 

It never hurts less. More than four billion years, and he hasn't stopped hurting. He feels like his heart is being slowly torn apart by ravens, shred by shred, as slow and excruciating as possible. 

_She'll die on you, you know. She'll blow away like smoke._

And even when he's dying. When his vision is blurring and he is screaming, he can still hear her, at the front of his mind. Dying. Laughing. Crying. Talking. Looking at him, with those eyes, fathoms deep. She's with him every step, every shiver, every punch, every agonising pull. She's waiting in his peripheral vision until he turns his head, and then she's gone. 

_How many have you lost? How many Claras?_

But he never listened. Not because he hadn't learned, he had enough years alone to know that human lives blink out like dandelions on a windy morning, but because he was trying to convince himself. Maybe this time, the universe will be kind. If he has saved it enough times maybe he can keep keep someone. Yet they still fall away like dust off a mantelpiece. And he still cries. And he still mourns. 

So many times, he had thought he was losing her. After Trenzalore, when he had regenerated and his body was still burning and screaming, it still hurt more the way she looked at him. _Like he wasn't there._

Each time he looks up into the night sky and sees the stars, he can only think of Clara. How far he must be from her. 

He prays to her every night. _Let me be brave._


End file.
